The only woman I ever loved has mar­ried another man

Dear Bren­dan Dear Bel HOW can I get over the re­gret of never telling my first (and only) love when I had the chance how I felt – now that she has re­cently mar­ried?

I thought I had re­solved these is­sues when she moved abroad and met her fu­ture hus­band, but see­ing pictures on Face­book and talk­ing to her I re­alise I’ll al­ways love her.

We met a decade ago as stu­dents. I was im­me­di­ately at­tracted but de­cided not to pur­sue those lust­ful feel­ings, think­ing they would be fleet­ing, and that I would be at­tracted to other girls as well.

Ini­tially, that worked and we be­came close friends. It was only at the end of that first year and the start of the sec­ond that my feel­ings turned to love. My sense of great hap­pi­ness and seren­ity in her com­pany is still unique. I al­ways com­pared new dates with her – which then ended badly.